Expert Reviews – Central Kalahari GR

Paul is a travel writer, author of the Bradt guidebook to Zimbabwe and is closely involved in promoting tourism to Zimbabwe.

8 people found this review helpful.

Wild and Wonderful

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3/5

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This reserve, the second largest in the world, is the ultimate get-away-from-it-all, wilderness destination. It is of course, desert so if you visit in the extremely arid dry season you’ll see vast expanses of sand, dunes, dry river beds and pans with sparse vegetation interrupted by the occasional, oasis-like ‘tree islands’. Game viewing is limited then so the best time to visit is during or just after the (unpredictable) rains, December to April. Exceptional numbers of plains game like giraffe, springbok, warthog, wildebeest, kudu, eland and gemsbok attract, cheetah, leopard and lion, with a very healthy population of wild dog. Sunset brought our small group of campers two very special treats – the amazingly loud serenade of thousands of barking geckos; and then we spotted a group of the illusive brown hyaena patrolling on the edges of our site in the twilight. CKGR is wonderfully undeveloped so you can only camp here; visitor numbers are strictly limited and with no facilities whatsoever in the reserve, your group must be fully self-sufficient. 4x4s are essential and deep, powdery sand can make driving slow and difficult.

Mark is a travel writer who grew up in Africa and has written over 700 titles for CNN Traveller, Travel Africa, BBC Wildlife and others.

4 people found this review helpful.

The pans and endless savanna of CKGR offer one of the best safari experiences in Africa!

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5/5

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This was my second Kalahari safari. On the first visit I had driven in from the north and concentrated my safari around Deception Pan. This was the area where the wonderful 'Cry of the Kalahari' (by Mark and Delia Owen) was written and it was a real privilege to see the Deception Valley pride, and to hear the big male roaring around our campfire at night. On this trip I made the full journey (with my father) from the south of the Kalahari, eventually all the way to the Okavango. The experience was one of the best journeys of any kind that I have ever made and we both agreed that we could happily have turned around at the northern boundaries and retraced our drive back to the south. Highlights were eating breakfast on the roof of our Defender among a herd of hundreds of gemsbok and perhaps a thousand springbok and camping in remote bushcamps (without another person in perhaps 50 miles) while – for 8 nights in a row – we had the Kalahari lions roaring around our camp.

Emma is an award-winning travel writer for Rough Guides, National Geographic Traveller, Travel Africa magazine and The Independent.

2 people found this review helpful.

Botswana’s beautiful, semi-arid heartlands

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4/5

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Famous for its dark-maned lions and for being the second largest protected area in Africa (after the Selous in Tanzania), the Central Kalahari Game Reserve is little visited compared to Botswana’s smaller northern parks and reserves. Its sweeping landscapes, which are the homelands of Botswana’s San Bushmen, cover an area of over 50,000 square kilometres. I found it a thrilling place to be just after the rains, when the plains are softened by fresh new grass, attracting wildebeest, gemsboks, springboks and their predators – but remarkably few tourists.

As well as the larger carnivores, you have a reasonable chance of spotting honey badgers and bat-eared foxes here. Birdwatchers can scan the grasslands, trees and skies for heavyweights including black korhaans, pallid harriers and the chunkiest of them all, the kori bustard.

Brian is an award winning travel writer, author of safari books and regular contributor to magazines such as BBC Wildlife and Travel Africa.

2 people found this review helpful.

Botswana’s bountiful desert

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4/5

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The Central Kalahari is no ordinary desert. Its endless sands and fossil dunes are buried under a shaggy pelt of grass and scrub and it is only the heat and lack of water that have made it one of Africa’s most unforgiving habitats. All through the long hot dry season this huge reserve – it’s roughly the same size as New Mexico – suffers under the burning sun. Then the rains come, falling from December to March, transforming the Kalahari into a carpet of greenery pulsating with life and colour, with wild flowers and monarch butterflies, korhaans and goshawks and noisy flocks of plum-coloured starlings. The season usually lasts well into April and is by far the best time to be here. This is when huge herds of gemsbok and springbok are drawn to areas such as Deception Valley where the best of the game is to be found, including cheetah, brown hyena and magnificent black-maned Kalahari lions. For the best take on this magical place read Cry of the Kalahari by Mark and Delia Owens, who spent seven years camping out in one of the acacia islands that are such a feature of Deception Valley’s glorious grasslands.

Anthony is a photographer and writer for travel magazines and Lonely Planet, including the guides to Kenya and Botswana & Namibia.

1 person found this review helpful.

The heart of the Kalahari

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3/5

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One of the largest protected areas in Africa, the Central Kalahari can feel like you’ve fallen off the map. This may be a desert wilderness, but don’t come here expecting sand dunes – the Kalahari’s dunes are usually concealed beneath thorn scrub and light woodland. Wildlife densities may be low, but lion sightings – Kalahari male lions have distinctive, luxuriant black manes – are surprisingly common; there are an estimated 500 lions in the park. I’ve seen Kalahari males every time I’ve visited the reserve, and have also had luck with cheetahs, bat-eared foxes and even a honey badger and an aardwolf, along with larger numbers of ostrich, gemsbok, silver-backed jackal, kori bustard and springbok. Deception Valley – a broad shallow valley of golden grasses and acacia stands – is the park’s prettiest corner but also sees the most vehicles. To the north, Passarge Valley’s terrain is similar, but less frequented. The south is pure wilderness, although wildlife is sparse.

Stephen is a travel writer and avid conservationist whose work appears in prestigious magazines such as Africa Geographic and Travel Africa.

Cry of the Kalahari

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4/5

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The Central Kalahari, ‘land of thirst’, is a parched wilderness and primeval landscape of sand, stone, grasslands and thorn-scrub. Peppered with the ubiquitous oryx and echoing nightly with the primordial roars of the king of the African savannah, this iconic desert dreamscape is like no other place on earth. Similar in size to Denmark, the wide-open arid expanses of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve are epic in scale and a favourite off-the-radar safari haunt of mine.

Encompassing the lion’s share of central Botswana, the 52,800km2 Central Kalahari is one of Africa’s largest and most remote game reserves. Set beneath gigantic desert skies, the near-endless expanse of arid wilderness is home to wildlife, wilderness and the last few remaining clans of indigenous San (bushmen) on earth. Although the area was opened to tourism back in the 1990s, its off-the-beaten-track location, unforgiving environment and limited infrastructure have preserved a genuine wilderness feel. With the exception of a couple of tourist camps in and around Deception Valley, the park remains truly wild and chances are the iconic big black-maned lions are the only other ‘inhabitants’ you’ll encounter during your desert safari.

Philip is an acclaimed travel writer and author of many guidebooks, including the Bradt guides to Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya and South Africa.

The Great Thirstland

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4/5

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This 52,800 sq km tract of arid Kalahari sands is Africa’s largest protected area, though it exists as much to protect the fragile semi-desert habitat as for the sparsely populated wildlife that concentrates seasonally in Deception Valley, which was incised by four fossil rovers. Mu only visit to this reserve was comically unrepresentative, as something like half the average annual rainfall fell in the space of three days, transforming the flat sandy plains to grassy swamps where the most common wildlife appeared to be the outsized African bullfrog. More normally, you could expect to see a range of dry mammals including oryx, eland, greater kudu, red hartebeest and possibly lion, brown hyena and cheetah. Dry country birds are also well represented. The area is of cultural interest as one of the last places inhabited by Bushman hunter-gatherers, whose activities are officially restricted within the reserve, but who still practice their ancient lifestyle in several neighbouring private reserves.

Ariadne is a renowned African wildlife photographer whose work is featured in many well-known guidebooks and magazines.

An expansive desert waiting to be explored by any nature-loving adventure seekers

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4/5

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This is probably the wildest place in Southern Africa. This huge desert area is very undeveloped and venturing inside feels like a real adventure. In this arid terrain, desert antelopes like gemsbok and springbok are common. The usual predators like lion, cheetah, wild dog and spotted hyena are present and you might also see some of the more elusive desert specials like bat-eared fox and brown hyena.

Birding is remarkably good with raptors being abundant. Unlike most game reserves, the best time to see wildlife is in the rainy season as animals disperse when the pans dry up. I didn’t see a lot of game on my trip, but the feeling of remoteness and adventure is what it is all about and game viewing might be a little bit hit and miss and very seasonal.

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